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- Title
Performance Evaluation of Radio Frequency Plasma Cathodes for Hall Thrusters.
- Authors
Hiroki WATANABE; Takanori DEGUCHI; Shuka TAKEDA; Yuki MIURA; Masanori ICHIMURA; Haruki TAKEGAHARA
- Abstract
To liberate Hall thrusters from the drawbacks associated with dispenser hollow cathodes, we construct and experimentally evaluate an outer-coil-type radio frequency (RF) plasma cathode and an inner-coil-type RF plasma cathode. The influence of the coil configuration on the electron-emission characteristics of the RF plasma cathodes is significant. Compared to the inner-coil-type RF plasma cathode, the outer-coil-type RF plasma cathode achieved higher electronemission performance. For the outer-coil-type RF plasma cathode, we obtained an anode current of 3.3 A at an RF power of 140 W, a xenon mass flow rate of 0.3 mg/s, and an anode voltage of 58 V. The anode current is sufficiently high to operate a 1-kW class Hall thruster. The gas utilization factor for the outer-coil-type RF plasma cathode is comparable to that for a conventional dispenser hollow cathode. On the other hand, the electron production cost for the outer-coil-type RF plasma cathode is four times higher than that for the hollow cathode. Thus, there is a need to improve the power consumption for application of RF plasma cathodes to Hall thrusters.
- Subjects
PLASMA electrodes; COLLOID thrusters; RADIO frequency discharges; ELECTRON emission; PERFORMANCE evaluation
- Publication
Transactions of the Japan Society of Aeronautical & Space Sciences, Aerospace Technology Japan, 2016, Vol 14, Issue ists 30, p77
- ISSN
1884-0485
- Publication type
Article